EDITORIAL: Trigger-happy thugs
It’s not surprising that SA is stuck in a violent Groundhog Day where individual rights are so often trampled by the jackboot of the state
SA politicians have a history of exhorting the police to violence. In 2008, deputy safety & security minister Susan "Bang-Bang" Shabangu told officers to "kill the bastards if they threaten you or the community. You must not worry about the regulations."It was a sentiment echoed by police minister Nathi Mthethwa in 2009: "We are tired of waving nice documents like the constitution and the human rights charter in criminals’ faces."In 2017, then police minister Fikile Mbalula told police to "shoot to kill" if they came under fire. Bheki Cele, in the hat of KwaZulu-Natal community safety MEC, was reportedly all for shooting first (he’s denied using the words "shoot to kill"). More recently, wearing his police minister fedora, Cele responded to questions about alleged police brutality during lockdown with: "Wait until you see more force."So it’s not surprising that SA is stuck in a violent Groundhog Day where individual rights are so often trampled by the jackboot of the state. It is, a...
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